


Rewrite - Forever: "Skinny Dipper"

by Cumberbatch Critter (ivelostmyspectacles)



Category: Forever (TV)
Genre: Dying Henry, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Immortality Revealed, Loss, Murder, Rewrite, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 04:12:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2759186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivelostmyspectacles/pseuds/Cumberbatch%20Critter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><div class="center">
  <p>Rewrite -<br/>Forever: "Skinny Dipper"</p>
</div><p>If "Skinny Dipper" had ended differently, with a little less shock and a little more action.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rewrite - Forever: "Skinny Dipper"

**Author's Note:**

> Don't get me wrong; I loved this episode!!
> 
> But this idea's been in my head since before the episode, actually, because I wanted it to happen this way and then BAM - winter hiatus. But, you know, it didn't. I'm playing with a lot of new elements here, trying to write it how it would be acted out rather than necessarily deep, personal thoughts (the wannabe screenwriter in me is showing a little bit ^^'') annndd a new tense for writing these characters.
> 
> I do not own _Forever_. Thank you!

Henry isn't sure that he can handle having the cops swarm his place any longer, actually. It's not for their lack of care - in fact, he's never felt so accepted than in this moment, draped in blankets, gratitude, and warm hands against his - but it's just... is it too much to ask for peace and quiet?

He casts his gaze from left, to right, and then settles on Abe from across the room. Abe meets his gaze. Henry sighs, and Abe smiles faintly. Right now, Henry can't return the smile. He's still all shook up, still raw from the encounter downstairs and from the thought that he might not only have lost his wife, but he could have lost his son tonight, too.

He hears a small clatter from downstairs and prays that the cops haven't broken anything. It wasn't as though he hadn't already damaged his lab, but the thought that the police are amongst his things makes him nervous, uneasy. He has a certain order to his chaotic madness, and there are also mementos of his life down there that would go better unseen. He isn't in the mood to lie tonight.

Instead, he wants the police to leave him be, him and Abe, and Henry will go downstairs and scrub the blood from the floor and pick up his belongings and put them back to where they belong. Then, he might have some tea, or a hot shower, and, with any luck (which he was hard-pressed for these days), he would go to bed and not dream about the fact that he has just killed a mortal man and that Adam is still out there.

Someone brushes against his shoulder as they walk by; Henry takes a reflexive step back and lets out a short, tense breath.

The phone rings and he startles again. He forces himself to take a deep breath, let it out slowly, and then step forward to pick up the phone. "Hello?"

_"Acquired a taste for it yet?"_

Henry goes cold. For all of his occasional, well-sought-after, genius, somehow, the thought of Adam calling hadn't been on the top of his list of things that would happen tonight.

_"Although, perhaps not. This is only your first kill, Henry."_

Jo walks back into the shop and seems to instinctively look for him. Henry meets her gaze across the bustle of the shop. He can imagine his expression. He feels cold to the core. He watches the compassion on Jo's face melt off into something entirely different, confusion that quickly turns into something grim-faced. She presses her lips into a thin line and mouths _who is that?_ , but Henry turns away.

"Why did you send him?" Henry asks, picking up the phone to retreat into the nearest secluded area. His hands are steady - they have been all night - but he can start to detect a faint tremor if he tries. He stares at the floor, and tries to block out the people around him.

 _"He was a fool,"_ Adam says. _"And this was a test."_

"A test?"

 _"Of you,"_ Adam replies pleasantly. _"You passed, Henry. Congratulations. Unfortunately, we won't have time to celebrate together. I'm going on an extended trip, you see."_

Henry swallows his irritation, and the little bit of fear starting to rear its head. "Why didn't you come to me personally? Why won't you reveal your face?" he hisses, pressing the receiver closer. "When will you stop hiding within the shadows?"

_"Look outside."_

Ice coils onto Henry's stomach at the words. He looks up. The world feels as thought it's in slow motion. In the street, there's a parked car. Through the window looms the therapist from Bellevue. Adam.

The ice expands from his stomach to stretch throughout his body. He's frozen in place with his eyes locked on Adam's. He...

_"I thought I'd get you a little present. Merry Christmas, Henry."_

The window on the car rolls up. Henry can feel reality slipping away, consumed by the thought that he had shared tea with his immortal stalker, consumed with death and life, and decay. His grip on the phone slackens. Still he can't move.

There's a loud _pop_ , like a car backfiring. There's the sound of glass breaking, of people screaming. Henry feels nothing, and then he feels pain.

There's no explosion of blood, there's no exerting pressure throwing him back against the table. There's a hole in his chest, and Henry is fairly sure that there is a bullet in his body, and that Adam - or rather, his henchmen - is the one who has put it there.

He drops the phone.

The world is no longer in slow motion.

_"Henry!"_

He staggers back and then falls. He scrambles for purchase on something, anything, but the table is too smooth between sensitive fingertips. He lands hard, and hears the commotion of something falling and shattering. He hopes it isn't too valuable. The breath is knocked out of him. He knows his head connects with the floor. His vision is blurry.

Asides from the initial shock of pain, however, he feels nothing.

"Henry, Henry!" Jo collapses by his side, her hands pressing roughly against the gunshot wound to his chest. There's a brief flare of discomfort, and then nothing.

Henry's dying.

He's been through it enough to know what it feels like.

He doesn't know if he's grateful that the ambulance that had come to the scene initially has already left, or if he's longing it were here to whisk him away.

"Henry, no, no, no, hey, stay with me." Jo pats his face, sweeps his face off of his forehead. "Keep your eyes open, Henry, stay with me."

Abraham is on his other side. He's muttering his name over and over again, too, and Henry thinks that he might have caught a _"Dad"_ in there somewhere.

He can't die like this. He can't die _here_.

"Henry. Henry?" Jo's taken it on herself to press the blanket against the bleeding wound on his chest. Her eyes are frantic. It's the first time Henry has seen her dishevelled.

Henry wants to _live_. He wants to live more than anything.

They can't explain this.

He wants to-

 

But then there's nothing and darkness and pictures race through his mind, spinning, turning, winding, passing his gaze at dizzying speeds. The last thing he sees is the imprint of Jo's face over him and he breaks the surface of the East River, coughing and spluttering and wheezing through a too-tight throat.

He spits water out and blinks the water from his eyes and looks frantically about himself.

Henry bites his lip and gasps for air.

 

**Author's Note:**

> [Also: nope, no second chapter. It's my take on the way the mid-season could have ended, and this is how the _very_ last scene plays in my head. Use your imagination. xP]


End file.
